Monthly Archives: November 2001

I included a map for those of you who don't know Toronto. The red star is our house, the black line is where the dog walked, the green star is where the dog was found, the purple line is the car trip she took, and the blue star is the dog clinic where she got picked up. As you can see, it's quite the walk!

We have no idea how she got all the way out to Richmond Hill… It would take something like six hours to walk that far. I suppose it's possible someone stole her right outside our house and then lost her while getting gas out in Richmond Hill. She's a very “stealable” dog. That's actually the only reason we got her back!

An old lady found her in Richmond Hill and decided to keep her. She took her in to her vet to get her checked out. Her vet scanned her, and the scan showed us as the owners — plus we'd already notified PetNet that she was missing, so they wouldn't allow a vet to do an ownership update…

Image update later today — I started working on it yesterday, so expect a big one. Scroll down one entry to see info on the mini-fundraiser please… It's doing OK — as of right now you've donated $295.94! Thank you! Even if you only donated $1.00, thank you! Every bit helps!

First, and most importantly, the dog is fine! She got picked up about ten miles from here (!!!!!) and then went to a very nice shelter and spent the day playing with other lost dogs and had a great time. Unfortunately, I suspect that this means that she has learned the wrong lesson.

She's a very smart dog — when she makes a mess in the kitchen, she picks up the paper towels and actually wipes up the mess and pushes it into the corner… So I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that she now has a puppy mythology that includes dog heaven which you can reach by running as far away as possible.

In any case, she's safe now.

As I mentioned, the silver Team BME shirts may peel in the wash. Only about 50% of them are bad (that's when the printer tells us they switched to the new batch of ink). What I'd recommend is that you wash the shirt by hand to be safe. If you purchased that shirt (and paid for it), you have one of three options:

a full refund including shipping

a BMEshop coupon (including shipping)

a limited edition BME shirt (we pay shipping)

You need to let Ryan or Corrie know (don't tell me).

Here's the limited edition shirt that is being offered… If it was me, I'd go for the shirt:

First, Saira and Rachel are out searching and putting up posters (they say “needs her medicine” on them so people won't want to keep her, and if they do, they'll take her to the vet who will scan her).

I don't know if you guys remember this, but I think that “my cute little naviel” may have been one of the worst experiences submitted lately. It was universally rejected of course. For those that didn't see it, here it is:

Name:

anonymousfemale / 12

When:

It just happened

Artist:

julia

Studio:

at my grandma's house

Location:

ontario

Okay i use to think that just the idea of belly button peircing was gross and trampish! but yeah i begain to like it ! then liking it grew into loving it ans wanting it badly! so i asked my mom anad the first thing she said was NO!!! I pleaded and baged! until finally she said yes!!! i was so exsited but the bad thing was i had to wait until December! and at the time it was in August! and well then september came and i totally forgot about it but then november came and i just totaly needed it! So i called the place that i wanted to get it done at but he wasent going to be back for a whiel then i told my grandma about it and she said why waist your money when you could probly get it done for free? i said where and then she told me about Julia a freind of hers at collage so i asked my grandma if she could possibly ask her if she can do it? she did ask and she could do it for 20 dollars plus i have to go and buy the earing so we did so then Friday came i was so exsited that i could barly talk! but she calceled and said that next wenseday i'll do it because she had a project to do i was sad and mad but then wenseday came and we drove to my grandmas house where it was to be done so i steped in and me and my mom got to talk to her and get to know her she was so so so nice! then the time came ! she showede me the needle it was thinck and really really sharp i was so so scared well more nervouis and exsited then anything! So she staralized my earing adn got a new needle out she laid me on the table and disanfected my naviel! my mom me and my grandma was there and julia!!! so she started to put the needle through and then it started to hurt! because it was going through the 2nd layer the inside layer!!! i said oucha nd tried to put her had away she got really nervous adn started to shake my mom grabed my hand and i bit her not hard but she continued trying to proceed finally she had it through she was shaking so bad that my mom had to help her put the barbell on! finally it was done and over with i had got what i wanted and it was cute i was really okay! i ware the bandage on it for about 2 hours then took it off! for the first three dayas i have to puit pollysporen on it and clean it with dial liqud hand soap adn then clean it with peroxide! when you out on the soap you have to rinse really good and not have anyleaft at all! that was my naviel exsperience! this just happened 2 days ago and 1 hour after it wasent even red! if you hae any questons just e mail me!

so if you want it do it its cool and neet!

what she did 1.she staralized my earing in detol! 2.then she put it on a plate and toook out a new needle 3.then she cleaned my belly button really good 4.then she put the needle through {it hurt but not for two long!} 5.then she took out the needle 6.then she placed the barbell. 7.then she but on a bandage! Hint… the pericer should always have new needles for every peircing if not it could be dangerous!

how to clean 1.wash hands really good 2. then out dial soap on peircing for a coupel seconds 3. then rinse it very very very good with no more soap left behind! 4.then dry it off lightly 5.then put the peroxide on it with a q tip then wipe light ly with another q tip! 6.put the polly sporn on dont use polly sporn for more then 3-5 days! after peircing!

so having a a naviel peircing takes alot of responsabilty so be sure to take very good care of your peircing and it should go fine also vidimins help speed healing time up too!

If you have any questions at all i'll be more then happy to answer them just email me and i'll answer! You may want to not do any running or gym for about a week adn be carfull not to get it cought on your paints that could be painful if you have an infection yuo will be able to tell cause i will have redness/sweling/major pain and lots uggy stuff aqfter peircing some of this stuff may happen like redness pain or sewlling its normal for that to happen after its peirced so dont worry if you want it do it you'll like it but you have to be willing to take good care of it every morning and night for the rest of your life!

Obviously people didn't have the warmest things to say about this one, and rightly so. Being young isn't an excuse — I've seen great experiences written by people who are only 12 or 13. The comments to the author included:

check…and you're 12? Are you kidding us?

Experiences need to be spell-checked and have proper capitalization.

Run your experience through a spell-checker and a grammar-checker, clean up the diction. Read over it several times to make sure it makes sense and isn't boring to read.

we should do a splling cheak

Needs to be proofread to correct the numerous spelling mistakes and to capitalize 'i'

It's a good experience, just a little low on the quality.

Words aren't enough. Please pay attention during English class.

very poorly written.

you're 12, i really think you should have waited and when you were ready you should have gone to a professional. I honestly cannot belive that your mother and grandmother just sat there and let it happen

Spelling errors throughout

How OLD are you? Read through that experience again. Does it look like easy reading to you? No. Use a spellchecker, and concentrate on what you're writing.

Wort.

Get a dictionary. Periods, not exclamation points, are used at the end of a sentence.

there is a massive amount of spelling errors in your experience. also, each “paragraph” seems to only a have a few sentences.

Please proofread and spellcheck. And realize that your body is still growing and that piercing's not a good idea at 12.

You need to spell check this, also, NEVER put peroxide on a piercing…

lots of typos, looks like you kept adding on redundant info to make the wordcount

horrible. you are 12, can't spell have horrific aftercare advice because you did no research

Spell check is a useful tool. Capitalzation helps also.

Spell check is our friend. (It's 'navel', btw)

wow, run this through a spell check please, its very hard to read

hard to follow,, generally bad english.

Very hard to read. A spell checking program would help to make it a bit easier to read.

the layout of the experience is great, you have step by step for the piercing and the aftercare which is fantastic. But the content just seems sketchy.

Have your mother read this: I will not question what you choose to let your child do. I will question the methods you choose. The unprofessional environment she encountered is not only going to possibly cause a rejected piercing, it could very well be dangerous. The cleaning methods being used will do little more than irritate the piercing. I hope appropriate jewelry was used — it was most certainly not sterile. Clean it, with water. Do not move the jewelry. Use warm sea salt soaks (1/8th of a teaspoon to a 8oz glass of water) — she can lean over holding the cup against her stomach. At the very least, use proper cleaning methods. I highly suggest you research what methods you use when allowing your child to undergo such a proceedure in the future. As far as the experience, help her write it properly if you want it approved.

There were about twice that many, but that was the general gist of it… There were one or two that were inappropriate (“you people are stupid.” was one), but overall they were no more harsh than would have written if they'd handed it in at school. Most people gave productive feedback that the author could have used to fix the problems. Instead, I get this email from her mother:

Subject: Re: my cute little navel

This is Monica's mom, would you mind telling me who died and made you GOD? If your so concerned about the spelling, then become a teacher . you have made her feel awful, thank you. We try to encourage our children. hope you don't have any. Because as a parent you would definitely fail. We did have a professional do the piercing and it is healing quite well thanks to PEROXIDE. I don't know what your idea of cleaning is. Its not like she got her ASSHOLE PIERCED but she definitely was writing to one. Im sorry you are who you are.

p.s. just to let you know you have made a few spelling errors yourself. just how old are you?

The punchline is that she changed the spelling of “naviel” when she replied…!

When the city told my landlord he legally had to install proper fire doors, he installed doors without handles — only deadbolts. What that means is that when you close the door, if you don't also deadbolt it, the wind can blow it open. Last night, the puppy was sleeping in the kitchen when that happened… Being a good puppy, she thought it meant that she was supposed to go outside so as not to make a mess in the kitchen I guess. Because it was sleepy time, she'd slipped out of her collar (she's chipped at least).

And now she's gone, and we can't find her anywhere in the neighborhood… She could have run far, or, more likely, has been stolen by a hobo… Please tell us if you see her…

I'm up early today because I got a phone call at 7:30 from my mother — I'm dropping the Vette off at her house this evening for winter storage. I thought it was CFNY calling, I had the vague notion I was to do a follow-up interview today but I guess that got cancelled.

you people are fucking sick. seriously.why the hell would anyone ever take it upon themselves to jam a rod down the inside of their dick?

And now off topic:

I mention it in conversation to people regularly, so I figured I'd dust out my links and mention it here as well... As I'm sure you know, Honda and other car companies are starting to build hybrid cars that are getting between 50 and 100 mpg. At the same time, cars are currently at a 21 year low for fuel efficiency.

In 1981, Doug Malewicki (the guy who invented the Robosaurus) built a car called the California Commuter. Going at highway speeds from LA to SF, he got almost 160 mpg. This was done using 1970s technology. His new car, the C2C project, is designed to drive across the US at 65+ MPH on a single tank of gas. He figures that for daily driving, you'll only have to gas up every four or five months.

I could name endless "real" (not "runs on water" conspiracy theory engines) technologies like this... Other good examples are the Veggie Van and the Grease Car, which show that diesel engines can be modified to run off of vegtable oil (like leftovers from deep fry tanks)... If you're in California, Grease Monkey Conversions runs regular classes (for virtually free) showing you how to convert your old diesel car to run off vegetable oil.

I know that people prefer going to enormous effort drilling holes in the ground to suck up oil and then spend enormous amounts of money building guns to defend it... but unless I'm missing something, it seems easiest just to build fuel efficient vehicles that run off of a renewable biomass fuel?